


three is a magic number

by theformerone



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-05
Updated: 2018-01-05
Packaged: 2019-02-28 19:57:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13278777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theformerone/pseuds/theformerone
Summary: When Harry had first asked Ginny to marry him, she had said no.Accustomed to things going in the opposite way that they should (or the opposite of the way that he wanted them to) since birth, he took it in stride.





	three is a magic number

**Author's Note:**

> title lifted from the blind melon song

When Harry had first asked Ginny to marry him, she had said no.

Accustomed to things going in the opposite way that they should (or the opposite of the way that he wanted them to) since birth, he took it in stride.

He hadn’t made a terribly large affair of asking. They were alone in the Great Hall, pushing a plate of cake between the two of them. After the war, students, professors, and everyone in between had come into the habit of keeping strange hours. Most of them just couldn’t sleep for memory of what had happened in what used to be the safest place in the wizarding world. Ginny and Harry were two such people.

So when he looked at her, with chocolate icing a smudge at the corner of her mouth, tired eyes blinking away sleep that wouldn’t stay once it came, sleeves of her Weasely sweater bunched up around her elbows, how could he do anything but ask?

She had looked at him like he stuck his finger in the non-blasted end of a blast-ended skrewt.

“No,” she said, and shoveled another forkful of cake into her mouth.

She wasn’t mean about it. Just factual. Honest. She denied it like she would deny a request to go flying in a thunderstorm; not that she wasn’t amenable, but she wasn’t interested. So Harry took it in stride. At least she had given him a straight answer. That was more than what he was used to getting.

* * *

 

The second time he asked her was the month before they were allowed to graduate from their eighth year. The pressure of exams hadn’t gotten to anyone except students who had been able to escape the worst of the war. Every student who had fought in the war shrugged collectively at the prospect of failing their classes; oh really, what a tragedy that would be.

There was a party in the Ravenclaw commons for any and all that wanted to attend. After the war, the house system had been abolished for the most part. Students were sorted year by year depending on how they grew and changed. Dumbledore had always thought they were sorted too soon; McGonagall agreed. How could anyone (much less a somewhat omniscient hat) decide who they were going to be for the rest of their lives when they were eleven?

He had caught her eye from across the room. She had given him a wink, then turned back to the students on her Quidditch team. She had been sorted into Slytherin for her absolute final year at Hogwarts; a shock to absolutely no one who had known her while Snape was still Headmaster. But she had become captain of the Slytherin team on her own merit. She was equally aggressive about inter-house unity as anyone who had seen younger Slytherin students in those days. Celebrated for something that happened by chance, and punished twice as viciously for not living up to the expectations of a man centuries dead. So the lion born girl made herself a family of baby snakes and they loved her viciously.

And something in that just _tugged_ at Harry. Tugged at him all the while he watched her talk strategy and grades and gossip with them. Tugged at him while she nodded along to the music played, answered questions, knocked back drinks, and just – _was_.

He asked her after he kissed her goodnight in the dungeons, so close to her he couldn’t see straight even with his glasses on. She scoffed and looked up at him. 

“No,” she said. But soft as cream and twice as kind. Like he was a child _just_ shy of too cute to deny a sweet.

“But –,“

“No,” she said again, a little firmer this time.

“There’s - ?”

“No one else.”

“Then, why?”

“Because I said no.”

And maybe it was the night making him tired, the promise of a sleep without nightmares for the first time in months, or the fear of being rejected a third time, but he kissed her temple and he let her go and he didn’t ask again.

* * *

 

He graduated. Pestered Kingsley about Auror training. Was good at it for a while. Was happy, almost. Dropped out of Auror training. Went to Ron and Hermione’s wedding. Dated Ginny. She wouldn’t let them move in together, but when she was in the off season they spent quite a bit of time together. He went to all her games. Watched her rise to Captain of the Hollyhead Harpies in her first two years of play. Generally didn’t know what to do himself.

He got by on family money. He lived within his means. Visited muggle museums and libraries and cinemas during the day. Got invited to do talks on the war, on dark magic, on reconciling the muggle and wizarding worlds. The first time, he was invited back with Ron, Hermione, Luna, Malfoy and his mother (though they were on a first name basis by then). Neville as a professor-in-training was leading the discussion. It had been seven years since the war by then. A new generation of students had come into Hogwarts. Not ones that hadn’t been touched by the war, no. But still very young and impressionable when it happened. They had things about blood purity and house prejudice to unlearn. Who better to teach them than the people who had conspired (together and apart) to save the wizarding world?

They gave different talks to every year. The Malfoys suffered jeers and taunts as expected, but the house mixing system had done a decent job in quelling dissent of that petty kind. More students were angry about what the Malfoy family had stood for during the war; others were confused about how to reconcile it with Narcissa’s saving Harry’s life and Draco’s refusal to kill Dumbledore.

Fact of the matter was that the war was a confused mess of hate and devotion and the only way to untangle it was to talk about it. And the more Harry talked about it, the more that knot unfurled in his chest. The easier sleep came at night. The less frequent his nightmares became. 

After they finished their talk with the fourth years, they were given a break for lunch. McGonagall invited him to her office and offered him the position of Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts.

He almost laughed outright in her face. But then he looked at Dumbledore’s portrait on the wall, a sly smile on his face. Snape’s portrait, caught between a sneer and something like anticipation. McGonagall in front of him, looking every bit the cat with a mouse between her paws waiting for it to run. 

“I’m hardly qualified,” he said instead.

She smiled a wry smile, raised her wand, and they got down to the paperwork.

* * *

 

His training took three years. Once he had his certificate of completion, McGonagall promptly gave up her position as interim professor and Harry took over. He still saw Ron and Hermione and Ginny, but he had moved onto Hogwarts grounds and had suddenly become rather out of the way.

The next time he saw them, it was Molly and Arthur’s anniversary. Ron had become an astoundingly adept party planner in his spare time after the war between the wedding and the baby showers and the Burrow was beautiful. Everything was washed in a soft yellow autumn light, Fleur and Bill and Charley in the kitchen cooking with Hermione narrowly keeping Molly from meddling.

“You finally did it,” Ginny said, sidling up next to him. He had been watching Dominique watch Fred watch Roxanne watch the kitchen, waiting for floating plates to come out laden with sweets.

He looked at her. Her hair was pulled down in a braid that hung over her shoulder. She was dressed in a thick grey cardigan over a green blouse. She stood relaxed, hands in the back pockets of her jeans. She looked softer somehow. Settled. 

“You did it, too,” he said.

She grinned at him, reached for his hand, and tugged. 

“Yes.”

* * *

The third time Harry asked Ginny to marry him, they were at Hogwarts. She had come back as an alumni to coach all four house teams, but it was clear she still had a soft spot for Slytherins.

The kids had just gone back inside when Harry stood up from the stands and shouted, “ _Ginevra Molly Weasely, will you marry me?_ ”

“ _You absolute idiot,_ ” she shouted from the middle of the pitch, “ _we’ve been engaged for six months!_ ”

Harry blinked. “ _Well this is the first I’ve heard of it!”_

Ginny let out a laugh, slid her leg over her broom, and flew to him faster than he could blink again.

“Well it’s the third time I have,” she said, hovering in the air in front of him.

His jaw dropped and he sputtered, thinking back to Molly and Arthur’s anniversary and the yellow light and her green blouse and that soft ‘ _yes_ ’.

“I didn’t know you meant – “

“Are professors allowed to be this dense?”

Harry laughed bright and loud in the cold spring afternoon. Ginny grinned, and tugged at him by his scarf and kissed him senseless. They didn’t go inside until after it started raining.

**Author's Note:**

> maaaaan i wrote this in a creative writing class like a year and a half ago and it's so close to my heart i don't really even ship hinny but maaaan sometimes you write self indulgent fluff and you just gotta love it
> 
> i really could've done a 5 times she said no and 1 time she said yes but three is a very solid number in magic so i figured hey, why mess with a good thing. 
> 
> thank you for reading x


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